


The Faery King's Bride

by otaku_lady89



Series: The Faery King's Bride [1]
Category: Kyou Kara Maou!, Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Alternate Universe, Arcadia - Freeform, But could be just brotp if you squint, Eloping, Faeries - Freeform, Fall Into A Magical World Trope, Fluff, Fusion - Kyo Kara Maou, Gratuitous Hand Holding, Hide is the Main Character, Kaneki is the Boring Best Friend, Kaneki's Backstory Is The Same As Canon, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, The Hidekane is there, The oc is only mentioned, Title has little to do with this story but will if i do future drabbles in this au, kaneki pov, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-10
Updated: 2016-01-10
Packaged: 2018-05-12 23:34:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5685910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/otaku_lady89/pseuds/otaku_lady89
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hide has been gone more and more from school lately, and it's making Kaneki worry. But when he is there, it's like something's missing. Perhaps Kaneki Ken's best friend is hiding something?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Faery King's Bride

**Author's Note:**

  * For [punchqueen.tumblr.com](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=punchqueen.tumblr.com).



_“On Midsummer Eve, when the bonfires are lighted on every hill in honour of St. John, the fairies are at their gayest, and sometime steal away beautiful mortals to be their brides.”_  
_―[W.B. Yeats](https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/29963.W_B_Yeats), [Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/46729946)_

 

 

He was missing at lunch when Kaneki went looking for him. He'd been out sick, the nurse had said, when Kaneki had asked. The teacher had confirmed, and said he'd even gotten a doctor's note. Although the writing was illegible, as was the wont of doctor's notes. Kaneki was left eating his anpan alone. Bought fresh from the convenience store just that morning on his lonely walk to school. Every step was haunted with memories of the two of them walking together, laughing together. 

Nagachika Hideyoshi was pulling away.

Kaneki knew it. He knew it the way he knew the silence of his aunt's stare. He knew it the way he knew the ducked posture of his cousin. He knew it the way he knew the pages of his father's books. He could just feel it in his bones. Something was going to happen, and Hide was just going to be gone forever one day. Kaneki tried not to be sad about it. After all, Hide was a bright boy. He deserved to go somewhere better. 

The bookworm wasn't stupid. He knew that Hide wasn't sick. When he was at school, he was spritely, smiling, the way he always had been. A bit wilder, recently, though, perhaps. Kaneki regretted not watching him when he'd had the chance. Kaneki regretted a lot of things about life. Like he regretted the taste of an anpan bun eaten all alone, without the taste of laughter on his tongue to accompany it. 

The words of the book in his lap seemed faded to him, his mind rounding back again to Hide. He wondered if he would take it this hard if Hide would just come to him and say that he didn't want to be friends anymore. The part of him that knew himself well said of course he would. But he would smile and wish Hide the best anyway. That's what one did when someone they cared for moved on. But this drawn out stretch, as if the string between them was slowly unravelling to the point of almost snapping...

The bell rang and he closed his book, and wrapped up the remains of the anpan. He would probably finish it on the way home, he decided, walking back down the stairs towards his classroom. Only losers ate in stairwells. Hide often took them outside, into the courtyard to eat their lunch. Kaneki enjoyed the sunshine, and it made him almost sleepy under the trees. The stairwell made him feel-

He opened the door to the classroom, and shifted past some of his talking classmates, all of them hushing their conversations around him. Hide had been the talkative one. Kaneki was polite, of course, but that didn't change the class opinion of him. He sat down, and pulled the book out, setting it in front of him. Figures moved around him, as he focused on the words, deciphering the grim story contained. He liked those best, the stories where the ending was almost guaranteed to be gruesome. The stories where someone changed beyond repair. 

He vaguely heard the teacher droning on, but he had his pencil in hand and his notebook open, so the teacher wouldn't bother him. And if he did, who cared. Kaneki was reading. If Hide had been there, in his seat behind Kaneki, he would have poked the reader in the back, forcing his attention off the book. But Hide wasn't there. Part of him wondered if Hide wanted to be there, in his seat, behind Kaneki. 

Of course not. Who would? Even Kaneki didn't want to be there.

The classroom door slammed open, startling everyone (Shiori, one of the girls in the back row, let out a little shriek) and drawing attention. For a moment, Kaneki's heart skipped a beat. Then, it settled into a squeezing sort of feeling. Like some giant had reached in and wrapped his fingers around Kaneki's heart. It was Hide. Hide with his big grin, and what appeared to be... Huh. Oddly enough he was wearing what appeared to be hastily thrown on street clothes. 

"Excuse me, but you're very late. Not only that, but your unifor-" The teacher started, and Hide barely paid him any attention, other than to make an excuse. Kaneki let out a breath of amusement, used to Hide's antics.   
  
"Sorry, sorry, I'm only here for one thing, actually! The principal asked me to bring Kaneki Ken down to the office?" Hide answered, scratching at the back of his head. It was such a familiar gesture, Kaneki instantly started gathering his things. His hands were shaking. His pencil dropped to the floor, and he had to pick it up twice. 

The teacher didn't seem convinced, but he whether he allowed it or not, Kaneki was out of his seat, his bag in hand and his feet carrying him swiftly to his best friend's side. With that and a quick, "Byebye!" from Hide, the two of them were out of the door, sliding it closed behind them. Kaneki wished he could have been surprised by the thick warmth of Hide's hand wrapping around his own, and the tug of it as Hide jogged down the hallway in the complete opposite direction of the principal's office. 

"Where are we going?" Kaneki asked, staring at where Hide's tan skin touched his own, at how their hands wrapped around each other like flower petals. Was Hide's skin darker than it had been the last time Ken had seen him? Was his hair longer, too? How long had Hide been gone? He couldn't quite remember. 

"To your place! We're going to gather up everything you own, and then you're running away with me!" Hide declared, and Kaneki choked on a laugh. Something so impulsive... He couldn't help but laugh like he hadn't in weeks. "Why are you laughing?? I'm serious!" Even Hide's whining made him laugh harder, his heart light now. 

"H-Hide, we can't just r-run away!" He laughed, almost unable to see but for tears of laughter. Hide tugged him out of the school entirely, and they were running now, the two of them, stumbling along like fools. "We have school! And your mother!" And his aunt, but she would most likely be happy to see the tail end of him.   
  
"Mom's coming with us! School doesn't matter! Stop worrying so much!"

It took them a breathless ten minutes to run past the convenience store Kaneki bought his lunches at. Another five to stop, gasping, in front of the gate to the Asaoka household. Kaneki had to suck down breaths, gulping back laughter, because they had to be quiet about this. Why was he letting himself be swept up in this? He wanted to be rational, he wanted to explain why none of this would work. At the same time, he was so relieved by the feeling of Hide's palms against his own (when had their fingers entwined like lovers? He should put an end to this...), so intoxicated by the beaming smile dimpling Hide's cheeks, that he couldn't bear to break from this daydream.

He gestured for quiet, a quick flick of his hand at his blonde companion, and the two tiptoed, not silent at all, with breathless giggles accompanying them, shushed by hands and the quick movement, as they passed the living room. Good, his aunt wasn't there. Perhaps she was out? Lucky.   
  
Up the stairs and into his tiny room, and suddenly Kaneki was hit by the reality of it. He was supposed to pack all of this up? The books? The clothes? What was he supposed to pack it in? How would they carry it? An entire life (minus the years he lived with his mother) in one tiny room, and he was supposed to do what with it?

He turned to Hide, and finally calm, demanded answers. "Tell me what's going on? I have no way of packing all of this, and you're saying run away today? Where is your mom? Hide, where have you been?"

Dark brows drew together, and Hide's lips frowned, but only a half-sort of frown, the one that appears when he's trying to peice difficult words together. His hand came up, and scrubbed at his head, as if that would put all of the thoughts in his mind in order, and Kaneki wondered if it was really so difficult to just tell him the truth, straight. Did he make it difficult somehow? 

"Well... You see, it's like this." Hide paused, both hands falling to his side, and his expression turning serious. "I'm a prince, Ken. Well... More like a King, now that the old man's knocked off, but I don't get crowned proper for another-" Kaneki's mind whirled, and he didn't quite hear the rest of it. 

A prince? Hide distrusted him so much he would rather come up with something ridiculous like this than just tell Kaneki the truth? A twisting, violent sort of emotion churned in the place between his belly and his ribs, and Kaneki didn't know what to do about it. His hand came up, fingers fisting in his uniform jacket over the spot, pressing as if that would alleviate it. 

"And so, yeah. Everything's more complicated than I thought, and I really can't keep up two lives like that, so I told them all I'm coming back to gather up the things I want to take back with me, and then I'm just going to move over there to make sure everything gets looked after. Running a kingdom is so hard, Kaneki. SOOOO hard. You have no idea, it's just awful. I have writer's cramp. Look!" Here Hide held up his right hand, and Kaneki could see a tremble there, but couldn't that just be from running?

"...Did you read too much manga?" Kaneki asked, not amused. "Hide, you're a highschool student, not a prince. I've met your mom." 

Hide huffed, clearly not happy that Kaneki was seeing through the ruse. Rolling his eyes, he put hands on his hips, and leaned forward. "Stop being obtuse, Kaneki, this is serious! I just told you. Mom was Queen of the Faeries, okay? But she didn't like all the court politics, so she gave it up and left to have ME. But my dad, who was apparently the king of the faeries, how weird is that, died mysteriously, and now I have to take over his throne. That's where I've been so much lately! They needed a ruler, and when mom refused, they asked me, and well... It sounded kinda fun, okay?"

Kaneki stared, waiting for the story to start making sense. 

"Look, I can prove it, okay?" Hide spread his arms, and like magic, wings spread out behind him as well. The kind you'd see in some disney movie, or on a bad RPG, filmy, glossy and scattering glitter or faery dust or something. They were beautiful. Bright orange and gold, and everything he hadn't ever imagined Hide would be if he'd been wings. Kaneki didn't often imagine his friend with faery wings. "See? Believe me now, Ken?"

They weren't the only thing to appear. Some odd sort of crown made of sparkling, shimmering lights appeared around Hide's burnt-orange hair, stationary and unmoving even as he moved his head, but at the same time, clearly not sitting on anything but air. It was... Beautiful. Kaneki took an enchanted step forward, reaching out tentative hands, and touched one of the little stars. It felt like nothing he could describe. Like warmth and safety and protection, and all the things he couldn't remember ever feeling anywhere but at Hide's side. 

"Yeah, those don't go away so long as I've got the wings out." Hide commented, tone similar to what it might be if it were hailing outside, and he was lamenting needing to bang the dents out of a car later. 

"This is-" Kaneki couldn't think of a word. 

"Incredible?" And there was Hide's grin again, and Kaneki could almost see a little fang poking out. 

"Impossible." He answered instead, because smug Hide was a very insufferable Hide. "I don't believe it. I won't."

Hide's eyes twinkled, "You will when I show it to you. Arcadia is amazing, Kaneki." Tanned fingers entwined with Kaneki's again, and he was suddenly aware, with a sharp breath, of how close the suddenly inhuman boy was. 

"H-How? I...Hide, I don't have boxes, I can't just pack-" He was interrupted with a bag to the face. Not even a backpack, just a sack, with a red rope for a tie, and Kaneki was beginning to get dizzy with how much Hide was asking him to believe. "...Hide..."

"It'll work, I promise! Illsy promised it'd hold as much as we needed it to!" Hide's confidence leaked through to his smile and Kaneki felt exasperation rise to the surface. "Cmon, if you don't like it there, I can bring you right back, alright?"

But what would be waiting for him, if he came back? Hide was staying in this strange Arcadia place. He had no place to belong here, without Hide. And if he were gone for days on end, and his things missing, his Aunt would most likely kick him out. He'd never be able to finish highschool, and then he wouldn't be able to get into college.

He took a deep breath, and nodded, "Alright. Father's books first." 

It took an hour of packing, with both of them playfully snapping at each other to get it done. Somewhere in that time, Hide had put his crown and wings back where they'd come from. Kaneki wondered if they had always been there, and only recently Hide had been able to find them. Had he been given them in the land called Arcadia? He'd tried to ask Hide, but all he'd gotten was more of that mischievous nose-crinkling smiles and a chiding, "Spoilers!" 

Finally, the room was emptied of everything, even the paperclips in Kaneki's tiny desk, and the soft pillow he'd had for years. Kaneki stood in the doorway, an odd feeling of permanence slipping over him like a thick blanket. Looking over the tiny room he'd spent so many years of his adolescence in, it filled him with nostalgia. Once more, a hand slipped around his own, and third time was the charm. 

"Let's go." 

Hide answered by pulling on their joined hands and the two of them were out the door, with nothing but the tiny sack holding everything Kaneki owned. Magic was real, whatever this was, and Kaneki wondered if characters in manga ever thought about what it was like to be in manga. Was he in a manga? He doubted it. If he was, he would have been the boring best friend who got left behind for the main plot. 

Instead, he was hand in hand with his best friend, who was apparently some sort of faery prince, and who was taking him to a park they'd been to so many times it felt like a second home. Bypassing the whale they usually sat on to watch the stars, Hide lead Kaneki straight to a wall of ivy that had grown for years. It was so thick that he couldn't even see the brick wall that was supposed to be behind it, the one that lead to the yard of the house with the nameplate 'Izura' on it. 

But when Hide pulled the ivy apart, there was only a doorway. No door, just... a black doorway. Something about it felt different, as if the air was heavier, or lighter around the doorway somehow. 

"Well, go on! I'll follow after you. Be careful though. Wouldn't want you falling." Hide nudged him forward, and Kaneki had only a moment to worry about what he would be falling INTO, before the vertigo hit him.

Once it cleared and he opened his eyes, his breath caught in his chest. 

Hide was right. It was beautiful.

**Author's Note:**

> Well here it is, my first contribution to the Tokyo Ghoul Fandom. Thank my friend PunchQueen, guys. This wouldn't exist if she didn't humour my ridiculous AUs.
> 
> This particular AU came out of the thought of what would happen if the Manga were Reversed. That is, if HIDE were the main character and Kaneki the 'boring best friend'. And all I could think of was Hide would DEFINATELY be the main character of one of those 'secretly a prince, dropped into another world' Mangas. You know the ones. Kyo Kara Maou is one. Look it up. 
> 
> Anyway, so this drabble came about because I was testing out if I wanted to devote more of my life to this damned thing. I still haven't decided, but I kinda like how this turned out, so who knows.


End file.
